


Carpet Vitae

by archersofloaf



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bodyswap, Canon Diverge - s01e16 Carpet Diem, Electron Carpet, Episode: s01e16 Carpet Diem, Episode: s02e10 Northwest Mansion Mystery, Gen, permanently
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-18
Updated: 2020-09-05
Packaged: 2021-03-06 01:08:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25974949
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/archersofloaf/pseuds/archersofloaf
Summary: When Dipper and Mabel have their run in with the body-swapping Electron Carpet, things don't quite go as planned and the two end up permanently in each others bodies.
Relationships: Dipper Pines & Mabel Pines
Comments: 1
Kudos: 35





	1. The Episode

Dipper slightly adjusted the painting in his new room, feeling satisfied now that he was all set to move into his new room in the Mystery Shack. He’d been squabbling and swapping bodies since they’d found the room this morning, but now he’d finally gotten Mabel to give him the room’s key and he would have a space all to himself. He sat back, muttering a few words of satisfaction, before he heard the telltale sign of his Grunkle Stan coming in to check on his progress.

“Ah, a man in his own space,” he sighed as he looked on at his nephew’s handiwork.  
“So what are you going to do with this old thing?” he said, pointing at the Electron Carpet that had been responsible for Dipper’s eventful day, now neatly rolled up and leaning against his wall.

Dipper gave it a quick look, then came to a decision. “Get _rid_ of it. But let Mabel and I do the honors. I don’t want this falling into the wrong hands.”

“Heh, you got it kid.”

Dipper called over his twin, and they took the carpet outside and began searching for a good spot to dispose of it. As they walked, Mabel began spitballing ideas for how best to get rid of it for good.

“How about we throw it in the bottomless pit?”

“It’ll just spit it back up after we leave. We need to think of something that’ll make sure nobody else will get their hands on it.”

“We could feed it to Gompers!”

“What if that gives him like, body switching powers?” Dipper imagined the mess that could cause. “ I don’t think we should risk it.”

“How about…” Mabel glanced around the forest, before spotting something and pulling Dipper over enthusiastically. “That big cliff!”

Dipper looked down the gorge, spotting craggy rocks, the occasional bone, which he hoped had belonged to animals rather than humans, and a churning river all the way at the bottom. If someone fell down it there was no way they would make it back.

“Yeah, that could work.”

The twins braced themselves, steadied their footing and got their hold on the carpet. “On three we both throw it in, alright?” Dipper said.

“One”

“Two”

“Three!”

The two chucked the carpet with as much force as they could muster, aiming deep into the gorge. It seemed to be going fine, but just as the electron carpet was slipping out of their grasp, Dipper felt his fingers graze those of his sisters for just a fraction of a second. Before he could even register what was happening, he was completely enveloped in the electric blue light of the carpet.

* * *

He awoke a couple of seconds later, and was greeted by the view of his own face staring at him with a concerned and guilty expression. Instantly, he put together the pieces of what just happened to them.

“Oh great, we switched again.” He began pawing around for the carpet, looking in all directions for it’s telltale bright blue shag. “Wait, Where’d the carpet go?”

He saw a pained expression coming from his- well, right now it was Mabel’s- face. “Dipper, you’re not going to like this, but i’m not seeing it anywhere. It must’ve gotten swept away when we threw it down.”

Dipper began panicking. “You don’t see it _at all?_ We need to start searching for it right now!” He attempted to scramble down the side of the gorge, looking ungainly in his new body.

“Dipper wait! It’s practically midnight right now. Can’t this wait until tomorrow morning?” Mabel yelled.

“The longer we delay, the farther away it’s going to get from us. It might end up all the way down at the ocean if we just give up now!”

They began to desperately search for the carpet. After about an hour, it began to dawn on them that they were not going to find the carpet. They had scoured every recess, checked under every strange rock, followed the river as far downstream as they could, and hadn’t even found any loose scraps of it that might let them hold on to hope that it was still within their reach. Defeated and tired, they stumbled back to the Mystery Shack.

Grunkle Stan opened the door to see two of the most scratched up and lethargic kids he’d ever seen. “Yeesh, what happened to you two. You guys look like you lost a fight with a bear,” he said in his typical goofy voice, before it began to sink in how sad the two seemed. “That didn’t actually happen, right?”

“We- we accidentally got switched again. And then we lost the carpet. And we could be-”

“Whoa kiddo, calm down. Getting all worked up about this isn’t going to help you out.”

“But we could be stuck like this _forever!_ We have no leads, no clues, nothing! Ugh, This is so frustrating!”

“Kid, I’ve put on a number of fake identities of my own over the years, but I’m here now as your old Grunkle Stan, aren’t I? You two’ll think better once you’ve had some rest in you. Now get to bed, kids.” He pushed them up to the stairs leading to the attic. “I don’t care what bodies you’re in, you two are still some of the hardest working kids i’ve seen. I know you kids can figure something out.”

“Thanks, Grunkle Stan. Mabel, we should talk in the attic.”

“ _Twins meeting!_ ” Mabel whooped as she bounded up the stairs, before tripping on the second to last step. “Why is your body so stiff, Dipper!”

Dipper chased after her. “Come on Mabel, don’t mess up my body too much.”

* * *

Dipper paced around their room, desperately scanning his journal for some clue while Mabel sat playing with the single hair that Dipper had growing on his cheek. He finally came to a conclusion, and slumped himself down on the ground to talk with his twin sister.

“It doesn’t say anything in here about Experiment 78!” Right when needed the journal the most, it had completely failed him.

Mabel tried her best to cheer him up. “At least we know that it’s an electron carpet.”

“I don’t even know what that means. I mean, It’s not like we can just build another one. How can it be that our best bet is just to keep searching for clues, and until then we’re going to have to deal with being stuck like this!”

“Oh no! Am I going to have to pretend to be you all the time now?” Mabel put her hands to her cheeks and tried out her worst Dipper impersonation. “Hi I’m Dipper and I love being a nerd! Time to go eat some books!”

“Mabel, we’re twins. Besides your braces and long hair, we basically look identical. If we just switch outfits then I bet the rest of it can be explained away fairly simply.”

“Aw man, It was going to be so much fun pretending to be you. I was totally going to ask Wendy out and everything.”

Dipper blushed an even deeper beet red than he would in his own body. ” See, this is exactly why we need to establish some ground rules. We’re not going to pretend to be each other, and we’re going to treat each other's bodies with some respect. That means no more eating glitter!”

“But it’s so sparkly,” Mabel whispered, gazing off into the distance.

Dipper felt a little off-put by seeing Mabel doing the puppy dog eyes in his body, In this brief moment where the panic wore off a little bit, he suddenly realized how absolutely exhausted the entire day's proceedings had left him. He felt like sleeping for at least twelve hours. The only issue was, he didn’t feel super comfortable doing it in the room that was the nexus of all of his current stress.

He looked over at his sister. She seemed to be taking this whole affair in stride. He could use some of that positive attitude to help him get through the night.

“Hey Mabel, do you want to have a sleepover for tonight?”

“Sure thing bro-bro!” Mabel responded cheerily, “Or should I say _sis-sis?_ ” she said, giving a wink and finger guns.

“Ugh, I hope I don’t have to put up with this for too long”. He felt faintly hopeful as he stumbled his way to his bed. This was nothing more than another obstacle on his way to solving the mystery of Gravity Falls, and he could feel that he was getting closer to solving it every day. He knew that this would be resolved soon, and they both could look back on this as some sort of weird twin bonding exercise or something. And hopefully that time would come soon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lol didn't this idiot read the description.
> 
> Also keep in mind I'm mostly writing this because nobody else seems do have really done it yet. I haven't actually written anything like this before, so bear with me as I get used to the medium.


	2. The Next Day Pt. 1

Dipper emerged from the hypnopompic state feeling… normal. It just felt like any other day at the Mystery Shack. Then he felt the itchy wool of a sweater on his skin, and yesterday’s events came flooding back to him. It was an unfortunate reminder that what happened wasn’t just some strange dream. He was really stuck in his sister's body and clueless as to how to get back in his own.

While he was groggily sliding out of bed, Mabel was already up and trying to find the perfect sweater to match with Dipper’s body. Dipper spotted her looking at a beige sweater in the mirror, before shaking her head and throwing it in a pile of discarded clothes. Then she spotted Dipper and stopped her dress-up to come greet him.

“Dipper, you’re finally up! We need to figure out our clothing situation fast. I need to switch back into my regular clothes or I feel like the stink of your outfit is going to rub off on my soul.”

“Hey, my clothes are not that smelly! You’ve just been wearing them for like twenty four hours by now.”

“Whatever you say, Dip-dop. But we’re going to have to change outfits at some point.”

Dipper once again blushed as it set in what Mabel meant. They couldn’t just wear the same clothes for two days straight. In the heat of the previous day, he hadn’t even stopped to consider all of the more embarrassing fine details of being switched. Mostly though, he had just tried to avoid thinking about it at all costs. After some discussion, they agreed to both try to do it blindfolded, and aiming to avoid anything below the chest as much as possible.

Mabel had already pretty much decided on an outfit, so she went first. She returned wearing a bright green and blue horizontal striped sweater and a pair of light blue shorts, the most colorful thing she could find among Dipper’s clothes. She now also had a few cutesy band-aids dotting her legs to cover up the scratches she had gained during last night's adventure. She then spent the greater part of the next hour trying to comb Dipper’s unruly mop of hair into something nicer, with little success.

With that out of the way, Dipper knew that there was no more time for him to delay. He steeled himself and started looking for something to wear.

It seemed simple enough. He immediately went to grab his outfit from the pile of clothes his sister had made on the ground, but she cut him off and chucked the clothes, stating she’d rather burn them than let her own body wear it.

Dipper thought for a moment. “If I get a clean pair of my regular clothes, will that work for you?”

“Yeah, I _guess,_ but it’s so boring. Why not try one of my skirts for a change. I’m wearing shorts right now, so it’d only be fair.”

“Yeah, that's not happening.”

“Mabel shrugged. “It was worth a shot.” This was well within her expectations. If she wanted to get what she wanted here, she would have to play the long con to get his walls down.

Putting back on his signature outfit, Dipper immediately felt much more comfortable. He felt more like himself than he had yesterday. The feeling of long hair down his back kept reminding him that he was not in his own body, but it was still a massive upgrade from wearing his sister's stuffy sweaters.

Mabel looked him over with a critical eye. “My hair’s gotten so tangled while you’ve been inhabiting my body. Mind if I comb it back to how it should be?”

“Let’s just leave it for now. I’ve had more fashion talk than I ever need,” Dipper replied flippantly.

The two headed downstairs to get some breakfast. When they arrived, Grunkle Stan was already up and in the kitchen getting some cereal.

He turned to greet the kids, a confused look blooming on his face as he noticed the discrepancies with their usual looks. “Is something going on today? You two kids look a little different from usual.”

“We got body swapped, remember?”

“Oh, right. My vision must be getting worse, I could barely tell that something was different.” Grunkle Stan rubbed his eyes. “So what’s your plan of action?”

“Just keep searching for clues, I guess. Not much else we really can do.” Dipper shrugged. It was a tough break, but sometimes you just have to deal with it.

“Sounds great. But remember kids, just because you’re tragically trapped in each other's bodies doesn’t mean you have the day off of work. Now Dipper, why don’t you go check that none of the attractions came unglued last night. Mabel, you man the counter. You can go searching during your lunch break or something.”

* * *

Dipper slapped the taxidermy duck head back into place and applied a little glue to the edges to keep it from falling back off and then hurried on to the next display. If their Grunkle was going to be so flippant about everything, he figured he could do the same. That carpet could be getting farther from them every minute, and here he was fixing Grunkle Stan’s ridiculous tourist garbage. Interrupting his negative thoughts, he heard a friendly voice behind him.

“Hey Mabel! What’s up with the outfit? Is there some prank I don’t know about?”

“Oh hey Soos. Actually, it’s Dipper. We’re still in each other’s bodies because of that carpet from yesterday.”

“Geez, dude, tell me if you need help with anything.”

Dipper recalled how Soos had also been switched for a while. Maybe he could provide some clues about how the carpet worked. It’d be a better start than anything they had so far.“You know, you were in a pig's body for a while there, right? Can you describe to me anything you remember about the body switching process?”

“Well I was wondering how it would feel to be a pig while I was patting Waddles on the head, and then boom, I switched into his body. It was crazy being so small and defenseless.” Soos cartoonishly mimed the entire event with his hands.

“You didn’t notice anything, _unusual_ about the process?”

“Besides the whole being in a pig's body thing? Nope.”

“Figures. Thanks anyways, Soos.” Dipper turned back to the display he was working on. HE noticed that while he was talking, one of the duck’s fake eyes had fallen back out of place. It looked like he had a bit more work to do before he could get back to his search.

Meanwhile, Mabel sat near the entrance to the Mystery Shack, playing around with some fake eyeballs as Wendy walked in to start her shift.

“Whoa Mabel, did you change your style up? I actually dig the short hair.”

“Oh no I’m just in Dipper’s body right now. Maybe I should try that out when I’m back though.”

“So that's what was going on yesterday. I can accept that. How are you holding up?”

“Pretty good. It’s weirding me out how sweaty Dipper is though.” Mabel demonstrated by attempting to throw one of the eyeballs, only for it to slip out of her hand and drop on the ground.

“Hey, At least you can try all the boy stuff you couldn’t do otherwise. Like reckless pranks and chest bumps.”

“ _Ohmygosh_ Wendy you are so right. To the town!” Mabel quickly ran upstairs, and returned with her pet pig, who she placed gently on the counter. ”And Waddles can look after the shop while we’re gone.”

* * *

Mabel skateboarded into town, properly dressed in kneepads and a helmet. She skated up to a nearby sidewalk and performed a kickflip, landing perfectly. “ _Boy Stuff!_ ” She shouted as she landed. Several nearby girls fainted. Mabel stopped and took off her helmet, feeling exhilarated.

Just then, two older teen boys emerged from a nearby alley and approached Mabel. “We saw your skating skills, man. That was pretty impressive. Wanna come back to our secret skate park?”

“Absolutely, dudes!” Mabel tried to put on her coolest smile and headed off with them.

Mabel was starting to reconsider her initial revulsion to being in Dipper’s body. It seemed like being a boy was actually surprisingly fun. She hoped that Dipper was having just a good time being a girl as she was being a boy.

Dipper was not having fun. He had just grabbed some popcorn from the kitchen to tide him over while he was fixing stuff, only to realize far too late that Mabel’s braces meant he couldn’t eat any of it. Even worse, Mabel's long hair kept getting in his face every time he moved his head. It seemed like being a girl had just made everything more difficult for him. Even through all of that, he refused to adjust his habits at all. He didn’t want to start getting used to this.

Dipper went back to checking the journal to see if there were any other magical items that could help him out. “Aging Eyes, Shapeshifter, Barf Fairy, The mindomancer? No, that's for mind control. Curse Reversal? I’ll mark that down for later.”

Dipper glanced over at the entrance to the Mystery Shack. Grunkle Stan said that he could go exploring on his lunch break, right? Maybe he could just take it a little earlier than usual. It wasn’t like there were many people in the shack right now.

He headed back in the direction of where the gorge was. Everything seemed a little different in the daytime though, and in no time he had ended up in a completely different part of the woods. Just as he started to become worried, he heard the distant sound of yelling and decided to head over to make sure everything was okay.

As he came closer, a chain link fence came into his view. Behind it was a makeshift arena of sorts, with ramps and curves fashioned out of boards of wood and old bricks. Inside were also a number of kids, some his age, some a little older, and… Mabel?

“ _Mabel!_ What are you doing?” Dipper hissed through the fence.

Mabel spotted Dipper, and enthusiastically waved and ran over to the edge of the fence. “Dipper! How come you never told me being a boy was so fun! I get to punch people, and do dangerous stuff and nobody even cares!”

Dipper needed a moment to process what his sister was up to. “You’re doing _what_ in my body?”

“Relax, Dipper. It’s just some friendly messing around.”

Two of the older boys from the bunch walked over. “Is this your sister dude?”

“I’m not a girl!” Dipper angrily retorted.

“Really, cause you look like one.” One of the two retorted.

“It’s just- ugh, whatever. I have more important things to be doing right now.” Dipper stormed back off into the woods to continue his search.

“You’re sister’s pretty crazy dude. Don’t worry, we won’t think any worse of you.” One of the kids gave Mabel a friendly punch in the shoulder. Mabel frowned a little as she saw her brother disappear into the trees.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now we get into how the two are dealing after the initial incident. I'm also trying to get the vibe of those s1 episodes down, buts its got an odd tone.


	3. The Next Day Pt. 2

Dipper stumbled his way through the forest. He had let his annoyance get the better of him and he didn’t really pay attention to where he was going, which now meant he had no idea where in Gravity Falls he was. Dipper felt annoyed at himself for failing to think ahead. He could bump into any sort of supernatural thing in the woods, many of them incredibly dangerous.

Even if he didn’t suspect that he was near the gorge, Dipper was keeping his eyes peeled for the Electron Carpet. It was unlikely, but someone might have gotten their hands on it and moved it somewhere more secure. Hopefully that person wasn’t Gideon or something.

His search seemed to be twice as difficult without Mabel around to help him out. Usually she would be there to offer some positive thinking or a silly comment to keep the mood light. By himself, he was just some kid wandering a forest in silence. But whatever, she was busy messing around in his body, so he could search for it by himself if he had to.

As Dipper walked deeper into the woods, he began to notice a subtle change in the scenery. Everything seemed more lush, with flowers blooming all over, and the plants themselves seemed much larger than normal. He began to feel a slight shimmer in the air as he walked. This was definitely related to the weirdness of Gravity Falls.

Dipper stopped to check out a large rock located near his path, carved with giant spirals. “I hope I don’t end up back in the Gnome’s hideout. They’d probably try and hold me ransom in exchange for Mabel. Oh god, would they try and make me their queen instead?” Dipper shuddered. He should really get a move on before he finds himself caught up in something.

Dipper sped deeper into the forest, following the strangely carved rocks. It wasn’t the most trustworthy path, but had noticed they were increasing in frequency and he figured it was the best bet he had of getting somewhere. Eventually he came across a clearing, dotted with Stonehenge-like monuments and covered in bright bluebells.

“Whoa, what is this place?” Dipper pulled out his journal and flipped through to see if he could find any clues. Irritatingly, his brief skim came up empty. “Stupid incomplete journals. I guess I’ll have to figure it out by myself, once again,” Dipper muttered.

He walked through the stone monument until he spotted a pillar that collapsed onto another part of the formation, forming a way up the rocks. Dipper scrambled up it, trying to get a better view of what was found around this area. He immediately spotted a stone tower with a conical roof atop it. It didn’t look particularly gnomish, so he decided to check it out. More than that though, he was just curious about what kind of new thing he might be able to discover. He might be able to add his own entry to the journal! Dipper giggled and pulled the book tight to his chest and he walked over.

From a distance it had just looked like a regular sized building, but as Dipper approached it became apparent that the building was much smaller, and very clearly not human sized. He approached the door, which was a little shorter than he was, and steeled himself. “Alright Dipper, there could be anything behind this. Be prepared for the worst.”

He reached forward to knock, but right before he could touch the door it suddenly flew open, revealing a number of miniature glowing creatures behind it. “Welcome to the fairy nail salon!” A small one up towards the top shouted in a high pitched voice.

Dipper jumped back slightly. “The _what?_ ”

The fairies swarmed over next to Dipper, examining him enthusiastically. “Wow it’s a human! We haven’t had one of you guys come here in quite a long time!” a fairy said, while examining his hand. “You look all banged up from the forest, how about we give you a complementary treatment!” Before Dipper could interrupt their manic train of thought, the fairies pulled him over to an empty chair and sat him down.

“Wait! Where am I, and what's going on?” Dipper glanced around, taking in the sight of a number of strange creatures lounging around inside the medieval looking building.

A larger fairy came over to Dipper's seat, and began to pull his hand towards a small table in front of it. “To answer your questions, you’re in the enchanted forest, the domain of the unicorns. And you’re going to get a manicure.” The fairy flew closer to him. “Maybe a short skin care routine as well, you look pretty ragged. Does that sound good?”

“Uh, sure,” Dipper replied, just beginning to take in what had happened. He thought more about what the fairies had mentioned. “ _Unicorns?_ Man, I have got to tell Mabel about this place. She would love it here.”

A fairy peeked out from behind Dipper's head. “Mabel? Who might that be?”

“Oh, she’s my sister. And part of the reason I’m over here now, I guess. You guys aren’t going to use that information to steal my life or something right?”

“Oh, heavens no. We’re just interested in hearing about humans. And it sounds like you care about this ‘Mabel’ human,” The fairy replied absentmindedly while working with a file on the ends of Dipper’s nails.

“Yeah, I do. She can be a bit much though.” Dipper reflected on all the things they had done together over the summer. Maybe she did deserve a little chance to relax and have some fun, even if she was doing it in his body. It just felt so off putting to see someone else doing stuff in your body, stuff that you could never do.

“Well, we’d be happy to have her here as well. It may cost you the second time around though.” The fairy replied in a lilting voice. Two smaller fairies flew over with a bowl of some sparkling liquid, applying it to his face and hands gently. Dipper felt a faint tickle from the fairies hands, which was barely enough to keep him from yawning and closing his eyes. The relaxing atmosphere in here was potent.

“Fair warning, it is often hard to find your way here. Often wayward souls end up here. If you wish to return, you may want to figure out what is causing you to feel that way.” The fairy continued as she applied a layer of polish onto Dipper’s nails.

Dipper mulled on it. He was going to have to see his sister again eventually. He was still feeling a little bit stung from the incident yesterday, but it wasn’t like it was her fault that happened.

He opened his eyes just as the fairies were wrapping up their work. He resolved himself to go talk to Mabel. “Thanks fairies, I think I know what I need to do now. Now if you don’t mind, I’m going to head out of here.”

The fairy flew over to grab something from the table. “Before you go, you should have this complementary sleeping powder we give to our guests. It’s a wonderful relaxant to deal with even the most cursed of wrinkles.” The fairy dropped a small vial of perfume with a four leaf clover submerged in a glittery liquid into his hand.

“Alright, thanks again!” Dipper said as he ran out the door. He wanted to talk to Mabel as soon as he could.

* * *

Mabel was leaning against a tree, taking a quick break from the high octane antics she had been up to all day. She glanced up at the sky. The day was getting on, and she was thinking about heading back to the Shack. Dipper could probably use her help searching for the carpet right about now. She got up and stretched out, feeling tired. Maybe she could stop by here again tomorrow.

She walked over the group of kids, who noticed her and pulled her in. “You haven’t even seen the best thing here. We just found this a couple of days ago.”

“Actually guys, I was thinking of heading back for the day. I can come tomorrow to do it if that's cool?”

“Oh come on, it’ll be quick. You have _got_ to try this.” The kids beckoned Mabel forward, and she reluctantly decided to follow them. It wasn’t like she was too pressed for time.

After a short bit of walking they ended up towards the back end of their little encampment. They brought Mabel to a particularly steep granite slope, dotted with the occasional tree, down which she could just barely make out an old barn. “It’s got to be the smoothest hill around here. None of us have tried it yet, but you’d probably be able to pick up a lot of speed,” one of the older kids stated.

Mabel didn’t like the look of it at all. There were a lot of trees you could hit on your way down. “I don’t think i’m up for this one,” she said in a shaky voice. “You guys go ahead on this one.”

“Come on, don’t be a wimp,” The eldest kid said, inching closer to Mabel.

“No, I really think i should just-”

The kid interrupted Mabel, a hint of menace now creeping into his tone. “‘We don’t want to have to make you do it.”

Mabel turned around and looked back down the hill. It looked like a long ride down. Mabel gulped.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was a bit of a wacky one but i was looking through the canon magical locations and i simply couldn't resist the allure of "Dipper goes to a nail salon" once i realized it was possible.


	4. The Next Day Pt. 3

Mabel turned back towards the gaggle of kids. “Why are you doing this? Weren’t we just hanging out.”

“This is what you have to do to hang out with us. It’s nothing personal.”

Mabel was being pushed backwards, inching closer towards the slope of the hill. She began to sweat as her brain raced through every available course of action. “Well, maybe I don’t want to hang out with you guys if this is what's required,” she retorted.

“A little late for that, dude. You've been here all day. Now you have to do this for us” The oldest kid pressed onwards.

She looked back at the group. She knew if she wanted to do something, she was going to have to do it soon. She just didn’t know what.

“ _Mabel!_ ” Her eyes snapped away from the group of kids as she heard her brothers worried shout. She locked eyes with him, his face contorted into a worried look. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small container, lobbing it in her direction. “Take this!”

Mabel gritted her teeth and pushed the kids away just enough that she could hop up and grab the bottle. Without even looking at it, she sprayed it directly at the kids faces. “Sneak Attack!” she yelled as the kids desperately tried to cover their eyes.

The eldest kid looked at her incredulously. “What the heck was that dude, what did you thi-” before he could finish his sentence, he collapsed into a snoozing pile on the ground with the rest of the kids.

Mabel glanced at the now empty bottle. “Sleeping magic! Nice one, Dipper!” She rushed over to where he was standing on the other side of the fence.

“Yeesh, what was happening there? I thought those guys were supposed to be your new bros or something,” Dipper said, a hint of worry creeping into his voice.

“That... didn’t really turn out so well.” Mabel shifted into a regretful pose. “Maybe you were right, and being a boy isn’t all it's cracked up to be.”

Dipper cracked with a wry smile, surprising Mabel. “Isn’t it a little too early to be saying that? You’ve only been a boy for about a day.” 

Mabel smiled back. “Yeah, I guess you’d know better than I do about it.”

“Now let's get out of here. We should leave before they wake up. I’m not really sure how long that spray lasts for.”

* * *

Dipper stopped running for a second to catch his breath. “That should be enough to keep them off of our tracks,” he said, hands on his knees as he tried to catch his breath. He pushed himself over to a nearby tree to steady himself. “Now we just need to figure out which way leads back to the Mystery Shack.”

Mabel thought for a moment, then pointed towards their left. “It’s this way!” She immediately began marching in that direction.

Dipper reluctantly followed along after her, still tired from running away. “Are you sure this is the right way?” He didn’t see any indications that it was in this direction.

“Nope!” Mabel replied cheerily.

“Well, I can’t say I have any better ideas,” Dipper murmured. Now that they were going at a relaxed pace, he remembered why he had run over here in the first place. He broke through their silence to say what was weighing on his mind. “Also, I wanted to apologize for being so mad the whole day.”

Mabel glanced back at her brother with a patient smile on her face. “Don’t worry about it, Dip. Besides, it's not like you were exactly wrong about that particular situation.”

“I barely even noticed the guys, Mabel. I was more concerned about how it seemed like you were going out and doing stuff in my body that I don’t have the courage to do.”

“Well maybe you had the right idea to do so. Seems like you had a lot more fun in my body that I did in yours. I see your painted nails.”

Dipper blushed and hid his hands behind his back. “T-There’s a perfectly magical explanation for this!”

“A likely story, Dipper,” Mabel said in a mischievous tone. “What kind of magic would involve that?”

“You’re not going to believe this, but it was fairies. And apparently there are unicorns there as well.”

Mabel opened her mouth in surprise. “ _Whaaaat!_ Dipper you have _got_ to tell me more!”

The two continued their walk back to the shack, swapping stories of how their days had gone, and how their new bodies had been affecting them. Dipper described his escapades in detail, and Mabel demanded that sometime soon he showed her where the unicorns were. Mabel told him about hanging out with Wendy, and then stomping around with the town kids. Dipper realized he hadn’t even talked to Wendy since the swap. He could feel that it would probably be awkward, at least for him. Though it couldn’t be any more awkward than what he tried to pull with the copy machine clones.

Eventually the Mystery Shack came into view. Mabel stopped them before they got up to the door. “There's still some time left in the day. We can do a little searching for the carpet if you feel up to it.” She asked.

Dipper shook his head. “We’ve got a lot of stuff going on right now. Let’s put it on the backburner.”

They opened the door to the Shack. Inside, they heard Grunkle Stan’s voice calling them. “Hey kids! You’re back just in time. There’s a new episode of Duck-tective on!”

The two twins looked at each other, then rushed in to come watch with him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A shortish chapter to end out this part of the story. From here i'm probably going to find an episode that'd be noticeably different in this au to tackle before I jump right into dealing with Ford.


	5. Northwest Mansion Mystery Pt. 1

From that day onward, the Pines twins continued their adventures while settling back into a regular routine of possessions, giant robots and memory loss. Today, their mission had them headed to the Northwest Manor to solve a ghost problem at the request of Pacifica. Though maybe they hadn’t all come just so they could exorcise some ghosts. Mabel had brought her friends along, who were all dressed up in hastily glued together outfits and excited to go to the party of a lifetime. Dipper, on the other hand, was entirely focused on his paranormal pursion.

Dipper sat uncomfortably in Pacifica’s limousine, gazing out at the crowds of people camped out near the Northwest estate’s entrance. The feeling of being in such a spacious car while surrounded by crowds on all sides was probably the natural state for the Northwest family, but for him it felt incredibly disconcerting. He hoped that this could be easily dealt with. He wasn’t good with parties, let alone ones of a scale like this one.

After a moment's drive they arrived at the main entrance. As Pacifica walked to the towering door, it swung open, revealing the grandeur of the entrance room.

“Welcome to Northwest Manor, dorks,” she announced in the most flippant voice she could muster.

Mabel and her friends immediately rushed in to examine all the finery on display. Dipper stood back,scanning for Pacifica’s parents so that he could get on with his objective. He quickly spotted them walking over to where he and Pacifica were standing.

“Ah, if it isn’t the woman of the hour!” Pacifica’s father said in a controlled tone. Weeks ago, when him and Mabel had first swapped bodies it had still felt a little uncomfortable to be referred to as such. Since then he had learned to just roll with it.

Pacifica’s father continued, “Hopefully you can help us with our little situation before the guests arrive in an hour?”

“I’ll do my best!” Dipper replied confidently.

The Northwest looked visibly relieved as he heard that. “Splendid! Pacifica, take our guest to the problem room. And uh, she’s not going to be wearing that is she?”

Dipper stood there in his regular, slightly scruffy outfit. It was painfully obvious that he had not thought to dress properly for the occasion.

Pacifica nodded affirmatively at her father. “I’ll do something about it.”

* * *

Dipper struggled as Pacifica pulled him towards one of the many changing rooms the mansion had. “Either you pick one of these dresses, or I pick for you.” She stated in an annoyed voice.

Dipper eyes glazed over as he saw the vast number of dresses Pacifica owned. It was a hard enough task to imagine himself wearing a dress at all, and the sheer number of possibilities here was overloading him.

Pacifica annoyance grew as Dipper froze in his tracks. “It’s proper attire for the party. Just pick one already.”

He glanced in, before taking a leap of faith and picking one that was a similar purple to the one Pacifica was wearing. Best to play it safe and stick with what the Northwests had already established.

Pacifica glanced at Dipper's choice. “Ugh. We are not going to be matching.” Without even looking, she reached into the closet and pulled out a light green dress and matching set of heels. “Here. The theme of the party is seafoam green. This should be fine.”

Dipper looked over the dress. He had no sense of fashion, so putting his faith in Pacifica’s choice was probably the best course of action. He just had to hope that he could be done with this ghost problem as soon as possible and nobody would have to see him dressed up like some rich girl. Especially not Mabel, who would probably never let him hear the end of this.

“I’ll get changed, but then we’re heading straight to the ghost, alright?” Dipper stated, in a hurry to get this over with. Pacifica nodded.

After a minutes struggle, Dipper emerged from the dressing room wearing the dress Pacifica had picked out for him. It was surprisingly comfortable considering it was formal attire. Dipper figured this was probably a better fate than ending up in some constricting cumberbund or something.

“Don’t forget the shoes, dork.” Pacifica said as she pulled out the matching pair of high heels. Dipper stopped to fit them on, and walked over to where Pacifica was. Or at least he tried to, before pitifully stumbling on the first step and crashing into a nearby wall, causing a painting to come loose from its hook and fall as well.

Pacifica rushed over to readjust the painting. “Ugh. Stop messing up our stuff!”

Dipper shot back, “who cares about a picture of some old fraud. Who do you think all this ostentatiousness is impressing, anyways?”

She scoffed at his comment. “Um, everyone? Our high standards are what makes us Northwests.”

“Funny, I thought it was lying about founding the town.”

Pacifica scowled at his comment and stormed off. Dipper chased after her, partly because he felt bad about trying to ruin the mood, but mostly because he didn’t know his way around the manor and didn’t want to get lost on his way to the problem room. He didn’t want to delay any further on catching this ghost.

* * *

The exorcism had not worked out as quickly as Dipper had hoped. Now he and Pacifica were sprinting through the halls of the Northwest Manor, as Dipper desperately tried to find a clue in the journal on how to defeat a spectre of its kind.

Dipper was clearly flagging behind Pacifica as they turned another corner. He stumbled and came close to tripping at a few points in the escape, before calling out to Pacifica, “You have to slow down a little bit! I can’t run in these heels at all!”

Pacifica turned around to deal with him. “Dipper we don’t have time to worry about-”

As she glanced back, she saw the ghost was quickly bearing down on them. There was no time to deal with DIpper’s problem right now. Thinking as fast as she could, she grabbed his hand and forcefully pulled him forwards. They were going to get out of here.

Dipper was desperately trying to continue his search through the journal, trying to shuffle through pages with one hand even as he knew he should really be focusing on keeping his feet from totally screwing him over.

“Pacifica! I think I’ve got something,” Dipper shouted as he looked excitedly towards a page in the Journal. He pulled his hand back from her grasp to check the rest of the page, causing his balance to tilt and make him fall onto the ground. The book fell out of his grasp and skidded across the floor, landing in front of Pacifica’s feet.

Dipper rolled over and desperately tried to crawl his way forward. Unfortunately, it wasn’t much of a competition against the supernatural flight of the offending ghost. He stopped and looked at the hall, checking in every direction for a way to thwart the ghost before it tried to take him out as part of it’s plot against the Northwest family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It turns out gender is pretty irrelevant to the plot of most gravity falls episodes so I had to really think to figure out what would be worth showing. not quite satisfied with how it turned out, but w/e.


End file.
